The Truth about Recidivism of Released Guantánamo Detainees
Submitted by JeanLR on Wed, 06/25/2008 - 12:29pm.
News of the Day
JUSTICE SCALIA, THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE,
AND THE PERPETUATION OF AN URBAN LEGEND:
The Truth about Recidivism of Released Guantánamo Detainees
By
Mark Denbeaux
Professor, Seton Hall University School of Law,
Director of Seton Hall Law Center for Policy and Research,
Joshua Denbeaux, Esq. and R.David Gratz,
Denbeaux & Denbeaux
Counsel to two Guantánamo detainees
..more..
Executive Summary
The defining characteristic of an “urban legend” is its ability to perpetuate itself not only
without factual support but in the face of overwhelming factual evidence that it is false. While it
is not surprising to find urban legends in the unmoderated precincts of the internet, it is shocking
to discover one in an opinion written by a Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
Last week, however, Justice Antonin Scalia, in his dissent in Boumediene v. Bush,
repeated the false accusation that “[a]t least 30 of those prisoners hitherto released from
Guantánamo Bay have returned to the battlefield.” His source was a year-old Senate Minority
Report, which in turn was based on misinformation provided by the Department of Defense.
Justice Scalia’s reliance on the these sources would have been more justifiable had the
urban legend he perpetuated not been (one would have thought) permanently interred by later
developments, including a 2007 Department of Defense Press Release and hearings before the
House Foreign Relations Committee less than two weeks before Justice Scalia’s dissent was
released.
On December 10, 2007 The Seton Hall Center for Policy and Research issued a Report,
THE MEANING OF "BATTLEFIELD": An Analysis of the Government’s Representations of
‘Battlefield Capture’ and ‘Recidivism’ of the Guantánamo Detainees, which demonstrated that
statements asserting 30 detainees had returned to the battlefield were incorrect. Further
developments since then, including recent hearings before Congress at which more information
was provided by the Department of Defense, confirm that the 30 recidivist claim is simply
wrong and has no place in a reasoned public debate about Guantánamo.
This Report concludes the following:
• At most 12, not 30, detainees “returned to the fight.”
• Of these 12, it is by no means clear that all are properly characterized as having
been so engaged since their release.
• According to the Department of Defense’s published and unpublished data not a
single detainee was ever released by a court. Moreover, every released detainee
was released by political appointees of the Department of Defense, sometimes
over the objection of the military.
• According to the Department of Defense’s published and unpublished data and
reports, not a single released Guantánamo detainee has ever attacked any
Americans.
• The Department of Defense’s statements regarding recidivism are inconsistent
with each other and often contradictory.
• This may be because, despite the importance of detainee recidivism, the
Department of Defense’s sources of information are media reports.
• Despite national security concerns, the Department of Defense does not have a
system for tracking the conduct or even the whereabouts of released detainees.
• The only indisputable detainee who took up arms against the United States or its
allies was ISN 220.
• ISN 220 was not released as a result of any legal process, whether a CSRT or a
federal habeas proceeding; no detainee has been released as a result of either
process.
• The decision to release ISN 220 was made by political officers in the Department
of Defense and was contrary to the recommendations of the military officers.
• The Department of Defense has never explained why ISN 220 was released or
who is responsible for the decision.
• It is at least plausible that a more transparent process would have resulted in ISN
220 still being detained.
...continues:
"Believe Me, It’s Torture"
Submitted by JeanLR on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 12:46pm.
Believe Me, It’s Torture
by Christopher Hitchens August 2008
Here is the most chilling way I can find of stating the matter. Until recently, “waterboarding” was something that Americans did to other Americans. It was inflicted, and endured, by those members of the Special Forces who underwent the advanced form of training known as sere (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape). In these harsh exercises, brave men and women were introduced to the sorts of barbarism that they might expect to meet at the hands of a lawless foe who disregarded the Geneva Conventions. But it was something that Americans were being trained to resist, not to inflict.
Exploring this narrow but deep distinction, on a gorgeous day last May I found myself deep in the hill country of western North Carolina, preparing to be surprised by a team of extremely hardened veterans who had confronted their country’s enemies in highly arduous terrain all over the world. They knew about everything from unarmed combat to enhanced interrogation and, in exchange for anonymity, were going to show me as nearly as possible what real waterboarding might be like....
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens200808?printable=true¤tPage=all
View a video of Hitchens’s waterboarding experience.
It goes without saying that I knew I could stop the process at any time, and that when it was all over I would be released into happy daylight rather than returned to a darkened cell. But it’s been well said that cowards die many times before their deaths, and it was difficult for me to completely forget the clause in the contract of indemnification that I had signed. This document (written by one who knew) stated revealingly:
“Water boarding” is a potentially dangerous activity in which the participant can receive serious and permanent (physical, emotional and psychological) injuries and even death, including injuries and death due to the respiratory and neurological systems of the body.
As the agreement went on to say, there would be safeguards provided “during the ‘water boarding’ process, however, these measures may fail and even if they work properly they may not prevent Hitchens from experiencing serious injury or death.”....
August 2008?
Submitted by Randy on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 12:49pm.
Something seems a little wrong with that date. Either that or the date on my computer is off and that last nap I took lasted a little too long.
August 2008 issue of Vanity Fair, silly!
Submitted by JeanLR on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 1:02pm.
coming to newstands near you
ahhh makes sense now
Submitted by Randy on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 2:42pm.
When I think of vanity fair, i don't think of the magazine. I work with the company that sells ladies clothes from time to time, so the name here didn't make me thing of the mags. Also, it seems like they would put the "real" date in the article since it's going out via the web ahead of the magazine date.
My apologies.
Now I still don't see how the mag can predict the future.. :)
Click on the video link
Submitted by JeanLR on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 3:17pm.
It's very short, but it will make you feel something unless you're a psychopath! The thought of the sensation he felt in this very controlled situation is enough, I cannot imagine, as he states, what it must be like for someone who may even be unable to tell anything to make the tormentors stop~ it is diabolical really.
China Inspired Interrogations at Guantánamo
China Inspired Interrogations at Guantánamo
WASHINGTON — The military trainers who came to Guantánamo Bay in December 2002 based an entire interrogation class on a chart showing the effects of “coercive management techniques” for possible use on prisoners, including “sleep deprivation,” “prolonged constraint,” and “exposure.”
What the trainers did not say, and may not have known, was that their chart had been copied verbatim from a 1957 Air Force study of Chinese Communist techniques used during the Korean War to obtain confessions, many of them false, from American prisoners. ...
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/02/us/02detain.html?bl&ex=1215230400&en=2144c0053de49341&ei=5087%0A